Blackbirds by Christy Gualtieri​When a child is killedall the nearby blackbirdsline telephone wires andstare down until the people belowwish in their bonesit would be them, instead.

If a child is killed in winter,it stays cold every dayfor the rest of their mother's life.The matchsticks she needs to keep warmwill remind her of her baby's legs mangled in the wreckage -tangled in the IV lines -floating in the tub -

And when the sky spreads overhead,pulled as tight as a sheet over a body,the patterns of February branchesand the black of the birds' featherswill cut into its clouds like lacerations on a face.

Christy Gualtieri's poems have been featured in Luciferous, Mad Swirl, and College English Notes. She lives with her husband and son in Pittsburgh, PA.